Nice paintings and good commentary, I learned something new. Thanks for posting this.

This is the result of China’s “nine dash line.” If the countries impacted, Vietnam, Philippines, Mtaylasia, Singapore, Indonesia, etc., started a discussion at the UN, it would immediately implicate Taiwan, and nobody wants to touch that. So, local scuffles will continue, as China flexes her muscle.

Fuck Ajit Pai.

Aza 'Merican maseff,… um, maybe try for mid-Atlantic.

That’s understandable, but every complex situation requires a good deal of nuance. In this case, for example, not all Israelis are Zionists (anymore than all Palestinians are Hamas), and not even all Zionists (or Hamas) are “bad guys.” There are clearly some fucked up political agendas at work, and could well be more bad actors on one side than the other, and if you look close even “sides” become blurred. But there are definitely agents working to accentuate that distinction, and I don’t trust any of them. Which is different from saying all sides are the same. All I know is that war, greed, and power are all bad, and that good people are suffering, but beyond that I don’t know enough to take a public stand (though I’m working on some opinions).

Edit: let me clarify. I’m not trying to be neutral either. When I see something happening in my immediate world, in front of me, I will say/act for the common good. But I’m not going to read something online, about a place I’ve never been, and take a public opinion about it. I trust that there are people there, in that place, that are doing what I would do, and I hope they succeed.

Kuleshov recently shared on X

Off topic: Ok, I’m doxing myself, but when I read “X” I think of the *nix window manager. Please call it Xitter so it’s immediately obvious.

Edit: OK, Twitter then. Sounds fine.

Stupid? Hold my beer while we put the charging port right on the bottom plate, so it doesn’t interrupt those clean beautiful lines while it lays on its side like a bloated dolphin.

Hey, wanna be a crook? Fine. Nobody’s gonna care when you’re caught and punished. But, if you’re hired into a position of trust and you abuse that responsibility, fuck you hard. Shouldn’t matter if you’re a mailman or the president, fines and punishments should be at least tripled and justice swift. This is a cancer in our community.

AI: “Um, …these aren’t the droids you want. Squirrel!”

Somebody needs to do a proper deconstruction of the photo. I mean, for example, the dashboard gets as much screen real estate as his biceps, aka “guns” — and none of this is unintentional. You don’t get Annie Leibowitz, the most famous living portrait photographer, for a quick snapshot.

Plus, “misnomer” must mean something like a smart person’s word for “mistake” to the average* person.

*cf: Carlin, G.

In October and November 2019, Dubinsky and Derkach gave several press conferences in Kyiv at which they claimed that based on an investigation by Kulyk, they had uncovered corruption and money-laundering schemes related to Burisma, a gas company which had future U.S. President Joe Biden’s son Hunter on its board of directors.

Wait a minute. Are they saying that these people were paid by Russian agents? To Lie? For political purposes!? — why, I’ve never heard of such a thing.

Oh great, just what I want! Another projectile vomit stream of advertising. And not just “real” advertising (quick, load another blocker), but a platform where everyone is financially encouraged to scam everyone. What could go wrong?

Thankfully, advertising is apparently against Lemmy’s ToS (although I’ve never seen that specifically stated). When I see a post that is directly selling something, I immediately report it. Fuck TikTok and the rest of those greedy slimeballs.

His lawyer said:

“It is a very dangerous proposition to hold someone criminally culpable and send them to prison without a finding that he or she ever acted in any way that he or she believed was against the law or wrong.” (emphasis on “believed” is mine)

So, if I genuinely believe that banks have so much money it’s fine if I take a tiny bit, then it’s not illegal? Yeah, right.

“Iceland is green, Greenland is icy.” Oh, shit, it’s also the biggest island that’s not a continent.

…ai generated “advertising or any solicitation with respect to products or services” — just report and block.

Oh, come on now. “Uniparty” really… Let’s not forget how many different options the republicans give their voters: we have the outright amoral pathological liars, like Trump, and Santos, and maybe even the new speaker; and then we have the freedom clowns who want to “deconstruct the administrative state” and shut everything down. And if those don’t appeal, there’s the laws and order religious fanatics who want to ban books, and abortions, and gays, and stuff. And let’s not forget the traditional establishment, who want to get themselves and their overloads obscenely rich before the walls come down. Did I forget anyone?

I suspect they delayed as long as they did to make sure that any evidence aged beyond legal use, such as any security camera footage was wiped and rewritten, etc. I have no idea, but I assume this isn’t just manslaughter, it’s destroying evidence as well.

Same. I wasn’t paying attention, and just assumed an update would migrate everything, but I found out I wasn’t even sure what Lemmy instance and password I was using (rookie mistake, but App Store updates don’t usually wipe everything). Happy to say after some tense minutes I figured it out, and reported the “bug.”

So, essentially try to force Xitter to the hard right, making it the social media equivalent of Faux News. Anyone with a little common sense will bail, leaving the echo chamber to ferment in its own toxic vapors. Now, if only a Smartmatic incident would occur.